1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to packaging for food products and, in particular, to packaging for fragile food such as tacos, tostadas and the like.
2. Description of Related Art
A long-standing problem in the food packaging industry is the packaging of brittle or fragile food products such as tortilla products in a manner sufficient to allow the product to be shipped and stored without damage. However, for tortilla products in particular, it is not sufficient to merely provide a sturdy package for preventing damage. The package should also allow for easy viewing of substantially the entire food product by a consumer prior to purchase because consumers are reluctant to purchase brittle or fragile food products unless they can easily verify that the products have not been spoiled or damaged. Further, consumers are reluctant to purchase products such as taco shells or tostada bowls without being able to verify the quantity of the product.
Several packages for tortilla products, particularly taco shells, have been provided wherein at least a portion of the product is visible to the consumer. Examples include U.S. Pat. No. 4,697,707 to Engdahl, U.S. Pat. No. 4,381,837 to Cortopassi, U.S. Pat. No. 4,018,905 to Adamek et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 4,299,850 to Wallen et al. Although the packaging structure set forth in these patents may provide improved protection of the tortilla products, a significant portion of the tortilla products are obscured from view by the packages. In particular, each packaging structure provides side walls of one form or another for enclosing and protecting the side ends of the taco shells, but which also, at least partially, obscure the side ends from view. With taco shells in particular, a likely location for chipping or damage is the outer end of the tortilla product. By obscuring the ends of the taco shells from view, either in whole or in part, customers cannot easily verify that these fragile portions of the taco shells are not damaged. Moreover, tortilla product packages such as those set forth in the exemplary patents listed above are typically formed from fairly complicated cardboard or plastic structures which require substantial manufacturing and assembly effort. In particular, these packages are formed from one or more cardboard blanks which require numerous fold lines and cut lines which require numerous steps to manufacture the blank and to later assemble the blank into a final package. The assembly steps are too complicated to allow quick and efficient assembly by hand. Moreover, the packaging structures of the exemplary patents listed above are adapted primarily, or solely, for taco shells and cannot easily be used for other tortilla products such as circular or rectangular tostada bowls or tostada shells.
Moreover, the cardboard used to assemble the packages of the prior art is often too thin to prevent the package from flexing or bending, thus allowing possible damage. Furthermore, those packages, which allow at least a partial view of the product, typically do not also allow for printed graphics and descriptions to be conveniently incorporated onto the package. Those packages, which provide adequate space for graphics, such as a basic enclosed box, typically do not allow for easy viewing of the product.
Heretofore, no adequate packaging has been developed for brittle food products such as tortilla products which not only reliably protects the brittle food product from damage, but also allows substantially the entire product to be easily viewed by a consumer, particularly side end or edge portions, and which can be easily and inexpensively manufactured and assembled.